An ill-considered turn on public education in NC

There are some things worthy of applause in the budget Senate Republicans pushed through their chamber last week.

It earmarks funds for expected Medicaid spending growth. It addresses neglected renovation and repair of state buildings. It eliminates a $376 million cut handed down to school districts over recent years.

The governor has laid out his budget, and the House will roll its out soon.

All have some good, but that's outweighed by a healthy dose of bad medicine for the people of this state.

The budget increases overall spending 2.3 percent, but how that money is spent reflects a seismic ideological shift in North Carolina.

A state that once prided itself on the quality of its public education system from preschool through the UNC system has been presented a Senate budget that would:

? Provide no raises for teachers in the coming year; this in a state that now ranks 46th in the nation in teacher pay.

? Eliminate the aforementioned $376 million but remove the class-size limits for the youngest students.

? Eliminate N.C. Center for the Advancement of Teaching and the Teaching Fellows program funding.

? Cut the school bus replacement budget $28 million.

? Phase out salary supplements for master's degrees for teachers.

? Eliminate the senior citizen tuition waiver.

? Cut $48 million to UNC system campuses.

The hits just keep coming.

Combined with things like a push for vouchers, last year's 1 a.m. House vote (with five Democrats absent, two of whom were ill) to override then-Gov. Bev Perdue's veto of a bill designed to weaken the teachers organization, the N.C. Association of Educators, by eliminating a dues checkoff from members' paychecks, the call to end teacher tenure and the elimination of pre-K student slots, some observers have called this a war on education.

If it's not a war, well, it's certainly a pattern.

Sadly, it's not exclusive to North Carolina, and in some states it's much worse, with schools being shuttered. In Chicago, for example, Democratic Mayor Rahm Emanuel is spearheading the shuttering of 54 schools because of the city's budget crisis. However, the crisis hasn't stopped the city from forking over $100 million for a new basketball arena for DePaul University.

Priorities.

North Carolina has taken budget hits on education for years. With the economy sputtering but moving in the right direction, it's time to set those cuts right, not add more.

The best analogy we've seen to this situation is by comparing school spending to military spending. If you sent an army out and it loses a battle, the answer isn't to send it into the next battle with fewer troops and more inferior arms.

It's the same with public education.

North Carolina spends an average of $8,400 for each child in the public school system, which ranks the state 48th in the nation in per-student funding.

Of course there is room for improvement in public education. The maddening high-stakes focus on year-end testing needs to be ditched in favor of a saner standard of accountability.

But we'll say this: North Carolina's teachers work hard, put in many thankless unpaid hours and are delivering good results in an increasingly difficult social and political landscape.

To cut, cut, cut and then stand back and call the system is a failure is disingenuous at best. To yank a teaching position out of a class of first-grade students and then throw 30 students to a teacher is a formula for disaster, depriving students of the bedrock foundation they'll need for the rest of their education (and lives).

And it is eroding the bedrock upon which the future of this state lies.

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An ill-considered turn on public education in NC

There are some things worthy of applause in the budget Senate Republicans pushed through their chamber last week.